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Giant Squid live in the deep sea and are rarely seen by humans. Recently, however, some Japanese fishermen accidentally captured a still living Giant Squid (it died soon after being brought to the surface). Although glimpsing a living Giant Squid is more cephalopod excitement than most of us can ever hope for, visitors to the Smithsonian Institution’s Museum of Natural...

Stenella attenuata and Stenella longirostris You have probably seen cans of tuna in your local supermarket marked “dolphin safe.” That label means the tuna was fished in a way that spares most dolphins from being killed in the tuna fleet’s giant nets. In this podcast, biologist and guest reporter Matt Leslie brings us a story about tuna, the intertwined...

This is the classic game of Memory – remember where you saw a species and try to find its match! There is also a quiz that challenges you to match species names with the pictures. Try one of our marine focused memory games by visiting http://fieldguides.eol.org/memory/ and look under “Featured Games” You’ll see some changes with the latest update...

Introducing M-EOL, a new mobile app and the winner of the EOL Education Innovation Challenge! Created by Natural Solutions and available on iTunes and Google Play. Become an explorer, discovering different plant and animal species by travelling around the world. Improve your knowledge about each species through descriptions, images, distribution information, and conservation status from the Encyclopedia of Life...

Pippettes, a tool for dispersing specific volumes of liquid, are quite possibly the most used tool in any bio lab. Most biologists buy their pipettes from a manufacture and they’ll usually set you back $500-$1000 for a set*. Or you can do what Kwalus did and make your own using a 3D printer, a balloon, a bit of duct...

An assertion that is often made by the more scientifically inclined is that it’s a great shame that the vast majority of people don’t know or apply basic scientific principles to their everyday life. Not in an over complicated sense, but rather to help overcome simple tasks, to aid getting to grips with new and possibly complex concepts, or...

July 11th saw the UK government’s announcement to pledge almost £1 million to fund several university research groups’ participation in an international collaboration to create the world’s first synthetic yeast. David Willets, the UK’s science minister, made the announcement during the week of the sixth Synthetic Biology conference which is this year being hosted by Imperial College London. Willets...

Life is becoming like raw material, waiting to be engineered – Oron Catts What is the biolab used for today? Discovering pharma-cures, creating the next pest-resistant crop, synthesizing recombinant bacteria to glow, sense, detect, digest…? We see something slightly different: where artists work alongside scientists to create universally beautiful sculptures, where a public laboratory performance is held to question...

The city of Darwin in Australia’s Northern Territory lies in the heart of crocodile country. In the 1950s, saltwater crocodiles were shot, skinned, and turned into shoes and handbags. After hunting was banned in the 1970s, crocodile numbers climbed. Now there’s a croc for every man, woman, and child in Darwin. Can the human citizens learn to live alongside...